A NEW SCHOOL YEAR Welcome back to returning school staff. Hello to those of you who are new to the area. Safeline has many programs and resources available for school staff. Please don't hesitate to call or e-mail Judy to find out about them.
ELEMENTARY: Have you seen the "Vermont Parents
Guide to Preventing Alcohol and Substance Abuse?" Prevention begins at an early age. There are sections about preschoolers, grades K-3, 4-6, as well as the sections you would expect for older students. Please call us for a copy or for further info about obtaining them.

A Cause for ConcernEvery August, the Vermont Crime Information Center releases a report on Crime that occured during the previous calendar year. The 2002 report recently released showed a significant increase in violent crimes. How does this impact our students and their families? From an article written by David Mace in The Time Argus:
In more than a third of both aggravated and simple assault cases, the victim and the perpetrator were either intimately related or family members. And the victim and suspect are known to each other in 87 percent of violent crimes. "The trend certainly continued in Vermont that these violent crimes are not stranger crimes.. But these kinds of family crimes tend to be more destructive to the fabric of society and so I think we should be more concerned as a community said Max Schleuter,Director of the Vermont Crime Information Center.
Consider, too, that these statistics reflect ONLY violent situations where there has been a conviction. The issue is far larger, because family crimes are often not reported at all for fear of retaliation, shame, fear of not being believed,lack of trust in the system,etc. Sometimes even when a crime has been reported, there is not enough evidence for a charge to be made or for a conviction. In the Safeline service area, there were a large number of crimes in 2002 with direct implications for our children and youth. There were 53 convictions for sex offenses (which includes statutory rape - sexual assault of a minor.) There were 289 "Offenses Against Family/Children" (non-support, neglect, desertion or abuse of family and children.) The entire report (including a town by town breakdown) is available at the Vermont Department of Public Safety website.
www.dps.state.vt.us

CongratulationsThe Youth Council of The Community Partnership of Orange and Windsor (CPOW) awarded 8 Youth Initiated Grants for 2003. Six of these were in the Safeline Service area. Area recipients were The Bradford Teen Center, The Center for Valley Youth (Rochester). The Newton School Band, Rochester Peer Helpers, The Teens Night Out and Our Voices Exposed (Randolph.) If you are interested in receiving information about your students becoming members of the Youth Council, please contact one of the Council Advisors, Judy Szeg, the Safeline Program Educator at 728-5647,safeline@valley.net or Lee Larson. Dept of Health ADAP Prevention Consultant at 295-8835, llarson@vdh.state.vt.us

Information to ShareSince our last newsletter, Judy, our Program Educator, has attended a workshop presented by the Anti-Violence Partnership: A Community Collaboration at the University of Vermont. She will also be attending several trainings in the near future. On August 19th, she attended, "Rape Drugs: Train the Trainer." She also received a scholarship to attend a two-day conference on Substance Abuse and Victimization. This conference includes such workshops as "The Negative Impact of Parental Substance Abuse on Children." (Including effective ways to work with child victims.) Please feel free to contact Judy regarding the information she brings back from these workshops and conferences.

Guidance Counselors/School NursesSafeline has a new video that you may want to borrow to view. It is called "The Secrecy Connection: Substance Abuse and Teen Rape" (This is intended as a staff resource only and not for students.)

New Bullying Harassment ResourceSafeline has multiple copies of a triple fold business card brochure produced by the National Center for Victims of Crime. It is called, "If you are being bullied or abused in any way...there is help." The brochure features Erika Harold, Miss America 2003, a victim of racial and sexual harassment when she was in high school.

BREAKING NEWSOrange County is one of only 2 or 3 counties in Vermont without a Domestic Violence Task Force. One is now in the process of forming. School staff would be very welcome to the task force!!!! The meetings will most likely be held in Chelsea, probably during lunchtime and we hope to have our first meeting in October (Domestic Violence Awareness Month). I'll send more details out to schools as soon as they become available.